Time passed. Raj suddenly started shooting up, going from just my height to taller than Obi-Wan in a matter of months. The younglings turned five one after another. Little Mei-Qan started to walk. And I got bigger, and bigger and BIGGER! My feet were a distant memory - I couldn't see them but I certainly felt them! They hurt all the time these days and so did my back. My wicker chair had curved to fit my ever increasing bulk and I needed help getting out of it. Sitting on the ground was out of the question - I'd never get up again.

At least I could still roll off my sleeping platform, (and I use the word 'roll' advisedly!) without assistance. Once up I'd spend most of the day sitting in my chair, set out in the sun, mending a constant stream of youngling tunics, breeches and stockings and watching our three little households purr along like well oiled machines - who knew Jedi were so domestic?

My state of mind had improved immensely too, thanks to my new mentor and guide. Hearing Qui-Gon's voice that afternoon in my cottage had scared me half out of my wits. Had I finally gone over the edge into delusions? I was afraid to tell Yoda what I'd heard but I had to - if I was going crazy maybe he could help.

Instead of looking concerned he'd been pleased. "Ahhhh. Hoped for this I did."

"What?" I'd said blankly

"Spoken of my new Master I have." he reminded me.

Yes of course he had. I'd assumed he'd been speaking metaphorically. "You mean you hear Qui-Gon too?"

He nodded. "Hear him and see him. Wise and powerful he is, help you better than I he can."

Yoda'd been right, as usual. Qui-Gon helped me realize my marriage hadn't been a lie; Anakin had been everything I thought he was and more. But he also made me see how I had contributed to my husband's fall by keeping his secrets and encouraging him to live a lie. And then he'd showed me how to let go of grief and guilt and go on. 'Without remorse, without regret.' But he hadn't cured me of my love for Anakin, nor had he tried to.

"He needs your love more than ever now, Padme." my Master had said gently.

"He hates me."

"He says he hates you. But what is hate but the bitter face of love?"

"What good is my love going to do him with me hiding from him in fear of my life and the babies lives?" I asked disconsolately.

"Love is never wasted, Padme." was the answer.

I spent a lot of time meditating on that. 'Love is never wasted' - yes I could feel the truth of it. But it seemed as if my love had done Anakin nothing but harm. Gradually I came to see it was not my love that had hurt us but my fear; fear of losing my office and of Anakin being cast out of the Jedi Order. But would that really have been so terrible? Why had I been so convinced we had to be a Senator and a Jedi Knight, why couldn't we just be Anakin and Padme? Would that have saved him, saved us? But - no remorse, no regrets! I had done what I believed was right at the time. If I'd been wrong then so be it. Let it go, let it all go.

All but Anakin.

One afternoon Obi-Wan and Yoda came to speak to me. I held up the pair of small breeches I was working on. "How does a little boy manage to tear out the seat of his pants and wear through both knees on the same day?"

A faint smile flickered over Obi-Wan's face. "Mountain climbing again probably."

His tone was off. I frowned at the two Masters, they both looked very grave. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong exactly -" Obi-Wan began and was interrupted by Yoda.

"Soon your babies born will be."

"I can't wait." I said fervently. "I feel as if I'm lugging the main dome of Theed Palace around with me!"

"Decide what we will do we must." Yoda said.

I looked at him blankly. "Aren't we staying here?" but even as I asked I sensed the answer.

"Brought up among their own kind your children must be."

Of course Yoda was right. A peaceful childhood on isolated Whillowan wouldn't prepare the twins, or Chani or the younglings to overthrow a galactic Empire and defeat the Sith.

"So where are we going?" I asked.

"Well, we were wondering if you had any suggestions or preferences." Obi-Wan answered.

I tried to think. Naboo was out - then where?

"Well hidden your children must be." said Yoda.

"Somewhere where the Sith cannot sense their presence." Obi-Wan agreed.

"Split up they should be."

"What!" I said sharply.

Obi-Wan looked unhappy. "I'm sorry, Padme but it would be best. If the Sith should find one the other might survive -"

"You're asking me to give up my babies?" I demanded, voice high and shrill.

"Ask we do not, but advise it we do." said Yoda gently.

I would have liked to jump up, run to my cottage and slam the door behind me, but my condition made it impossible. Instead I struggled to get out of my chair. Obi-Wan reached a hand to help me but I shook him off as soon as I was upright. "No! I can't - I can't! Don't you understand," I wailed, "my children are all I've got!"

"Padme -" Obi-Wan began helplessly, but once again Yoda overrode him.

"Meditate." he said. "Listen for the Will of the Force you must."

I didn't say anything. I waddled past them into my house and I did manage to slam the door. Then I collapsed onto my sleep platform.

'I won't!' I told myself fiercely. "I won't. To hell with what the Force wants! They can't make me, and neither can It!"

Gradually I realized I was no longer alone. I looked up to see Qui-Gon, lucent and luminous with a soft green radiance, sitting on a stool facing me. I wasn't surprised. He came to me often and easily now, when I wanted him - and when I didn't.

"I suppose you're here to tell me to give up my babies too." I said defiantly.

"The decision is yours, Padme." He answered mildly. "You are the children's mother, it is for you to choose what is best for them."

Oh how I wished he hadn't put it that way. In those few words he changed the question from what I wanted to what was best for Luke and Leia.

"I'm their mother," I repeated painfully, "I love them so. How can sending them away from me be best for them? And where is there for any of us to go?"

"Still your mind." my Master said soothingly, almost hypnotically. "Let go of your fears, open yourself to the Force, and It will tell you what you must do. Remember, Padme, Love is the essence of the Force. It asks hard things of us, but it also gives us the strength to do them."

I stilled my mind, I let the fear, the pain, the anger drain out of me. I sensed my children cuddled snugly together in my womb - how could I separate them? I let that question go too. At last my inner silence was broken by a voice, the last voice I would ever have expected to hear utter the Will of the Force. It was Anakin's voice repeating words spoken long ago, words whose truth neither of us had truly understood at the time:

"Attachment is forbidden. Possession is forbidden. Compassion, which I would define as unconditional love, is central to a Jedi's life."

And to a mother's life too. Calm and centered I knew what I must do - without remorse and without regret.

"Hidden, safe the children must be kept. Foundation of the new Jedi Order they will be." Yoda said.

The younglings had been tucked into their beds with Threepio to watch over them. All us adults, including Raj and Yedda, had gathered in Obi-Wan's cottage. Mei-Qan slept soundly in her little cocoon of blankets on the sleep platform, undisturbed by our voices. I sat in my chair, Yoda and Obi-Wan on stools, and the two Padawans on the floor.

"Know a good place to hide, I do." the old Master continued. "Remote, uninhabited. Take the younglings there I will and complete their training." Surely not even our fearsome fivesome could do much harm on an uninhabited world. Yoda glanced at me with raised ears. "Ideas of your own you have, Padme?"

"Yes, Master." I said, voice firm. "Obi-Wan, I want you to take Luke to Owen and Beru on Tatooine. I know they'll love him for Shmi's sake."

He nodded "I was thinking of Tatooine for myself. It's a good hiding place, outside the Empire's borders, and the Larses are my family too. If anything should happen to me they'd take care of Chani."

I smiled at him. "You mustn't let anything happen to you, Obi-Wan. When Luke is old enough I want you to train him, as you trained his father."

He grimaced. "Better than that I hope!"

"If you failed Anakin, Obi-Wan, it wasn't your fault." I told him.

His eyebrows went up fractionally. "Then whose?"

"Mine I'm afraid." I answered grimly. "Anakin kept secrets from you, and I helped him do it."

Obi-Wan frowned. "What kind of secrets?"

"Things he'd done." I said quietly. "Terrible things. If he'd told you - if you'd known - maybe you could have helped him before it was too late."

"I would have sensed it if he were hiding something -" he began distressed then stopped, eyes going out of focus, remembering. "Oh no." he said softly. "Oh, Ani. I should have listened to myself!"

"Listen more we all should have." Yoda said ruefully.

Obi-Wan gave me one of his very straight looks out of those lucent blue eyes. "There was nothing Anakin couldn't have told me. Nothing."

I bowed my head. "I know." it was no good explaining. Obi-Wan knew Anakin had loved him, knew he had sometimes resented him, but he'd never known Anakin feared him - and it would only hurt him to tell him so now. Poor Obi-Wan, he didn't realize - perhaps couldn't realize - how much he'd intimidated Anakin. 'Wiser than Master Yoda, more powerful than Master Windu' the irreproachable, perfect Jedi who could never understand or forgive madness and murder.

"And your daughter, What of her?" Yoda asked gently, breaking into my thoughts.

I took a deep breath. I might have to fight for this part of my plan. "It's going to take more than Jedi to overthrow the Empire. We're going to need a political leader too. I will take Leia to Alderaan. I know Bail and Breha would love a baby girl to raise. And they will be able to give her the education and backing she'll need to become that leader."

To my relief I saw no protest on Yoda's wrinkled face, instead he nodded slowly. "Sooo... the son in his father's footsteps will walk. The daughter her mother's path tread. Fitting that is."

"But Alderaan," Obi-Wan said doubtfully, "a core-world practically under the Emperor's nose."

I grinned. "Hiding in plain sight was your specialty wasn't it, General?"

An answering smile passed over his face but his eyes stayed troubled.

"Safe it will be." Yoda said. "Moriah there is."

"Of course! Her Force presence will eclipse Leia's!"

"Who?" I asked.

"A Padawan of mine she was." Yoda explained. His ears drooped. "My last. Failed her I did. Left the Jedi to go home to her family."

"She's a princess of the House of Organa." Obi-Wan added. "I'm not sure what relation she is to Prince Bail but I know she lives in the royal palace at Aldera."

"Teach Raj and Yedda too she can." said Yoda. "My hands full will be, and Obi-Wan's."

"But she left the Order," Raj ventured, "maybe she won't want to -"

"Do it she will." Yoda said firmly, and smiled crookedly. "As a last favor to her misguided old Master."

"All right," I said, "Raj and Yedda will come with Leia and me to Alderaan. I guess I'll be taking Threepio and Artoo too?"

"Definitely!" Obi-Wan said with some emphasis.

"Have no need of a droid will I." Yoda agreed. "Travel in your skiff you will, Padme. The rest of us the freighter will take. Drop the younglings and I at Dagobah Obi-Wan will then go on to Tatooine."

"One more thing." I said steadily. "Obi-Wan I want you to take Luke away the minute he's born. I don't want to hold him, or even see him."

"But surely that will make it worse for you." he protested. "A proper farewell -"

"Might be better for some women, but not me." I managed a smile. "I've thought it over very carefully, Obi-Wan. The only way I can bear it is if Luke isn't quite real to me. Right now he's an idea, a hope, I can let that go. But not a baby, not - my baby."

Slowly Obi-Wan nodded. "Very well. But if you change your mind -"

"I won't." I said.